Claiming Your Grimm
by ChibiAyane
Summary: Sean Renard is very possessive of his Grimm, and he will do anything to keep him, even claim him as his mate without the Grimm's permission.
1. Chapter 1

**Claiming Your Grimm**

**Chapter 1**

Nick thought it was getting a little annoying. The Captain had gotten ridiculously overprotective of Nick ever since his brother, Eric, had gotten so terrifyingly close to stealing his Grimm and then the whole Cracher Mortel's "Zombie Apocalypse" thing, as Hank was calling it. And, if he didn't find the overprotectiveness annoying enough on its own, he certainly never expected the headache that came with the Captain's glaringly obvious and ever growing attraction to the Grimm of Portland. Though, it wasn't so obvious to Nick when it started.

When Juliette left Nick, it was after a break-up that was heart shattering for both of them. She decided that, even though she loved Nick deeply and would very much have loved to marry him, she couldn't handle the constant danger and excitement that came with him and his career and his status as a Grimm. So, they broke it off on good terms, both of them with tears rolling down their cheeks, and decided to be just very close friends. She moved out to rid them both of the temptation of getting back together or doing something that they might later regret.

As soon as Juliette left and Nick's single status had gone around the precinct, Captain Sean Renard, for lack of a better word, jumped. At first, it was only sly smiles, slight innocuous touches and friendly banter. Then, it progressed to a sort of friendship; going out for drinks, eating lunch at the same time and/or place, talking and getting to know each other better, etc. But none of that really bothered Nick.

Nick did notice the interest, and it seemed every time Nick went through something else and gained yet another skill or sense, Renard's interest in him grew - as did the protectiveness. He got angry every time Nick got hurt or came close to getting hurt or worse, killed (and, boy, did he throw a fit worthy of Royalty when Nick went into that house full of Skalengecks without waiting for back-up). He seemed to be involving himself in almost every Wesen case that came Nick's way, just as an added safety measure, as he put it when Nick asked why. "Don't want to lose my best detective," he'd said.

Nothing really screamed, "I'm attracted to you!", at least, not to Nick. Wu and Hank kept giving each other looks over Nick's and the Captain's heads or behind their backs, not that Nick saw these. Really, for a star detective with the highest case closure rate in the Northwest, he was painfully unobservant about things that involved his own life and the way the people close to him acted around him.

No. Ever oblivious Nick never saw it coming - until the actual touching started.

It first happened after a night out, drinking with the Captain, Hank and Wu. Nick got smashed, mostly because Wu kept cheating at their drinking game and Nick didn't notice until it was too late and his car keys had been confiscated. The Captain had only had two drinks over a four hour period, so he was okay to drive and volunteered to take Nick home. Hank and Wu went home in a cab, both of them with knowing looks in their eyes.

The Captain took Nick home, except, he didn't drive to Nick's home to just drop him off. He'd driven them both to his own penthouse apartment, where he basically carried Nick from the car to the elevator and then through his front door. He walked (more like staggered, because Nick could barely stand) them into the sitting room, where he dumped Nick onto the sofa.

All Nick remembered was having a dream. A dream that was dangerously close to being wet. It was filled with light caresses and loving kisses. He remembered gentle hands, whispered words, soft lips, warm breath and a hot tongue. There was a shock of sharp teeth at one point, but that had been soothed with more from that hot tongue and those soft lips.

When he woke up to the smell of fresh coffee and bacon, he found himself curled up on Renard's sofa, wrapped up in a thick blanket and he saw his belt, jacket and button-up shirt were folded neatly on the coffee table and his shoes with his socks stuffed inside them were tucked underneath it. His dream flitted away from his conscious mind, as it was rudely overwritten by the killer hangover that boomed through his skull the second the light hit his eyes.

After that night, it just seemed like the Captain was getting comfortable around Nick, which Nick didn't really see a problem with since he was a good friend now. The light touches continued, the brush of fingers that could easily be taken as an accident from being too close. Once or twice, it had crossed Nick's mind that the Captain was in his personal space, those few times when he'd gotten far too close. But he'd never, in his wildest dreams, imagined that the man might've been doing it on purpose.

And speaking of dreams, Nick didn't think anything of the dream he'd had while he was drunk, at first. But then he went over to Monroe and Rosalee's house for lunch.

"Oh, man!" Monroe exclaimed, when he opened the door and hastily covered his nose. "What the hell!? Warn a wolf!"

"Warn you about what?" Nick asked bemusedly, stepping inside and closing the door.

"Dude, you reek of Anspruch pheromones!" Monroe said, waving his hand in front of his nose to ward off the smell.

"Of what?" Nick asked, staring at his best friend like he was speaking in foreign tongues. Which he was - again.

"Claiming pheromones? Someone Claimed you as their mate, with a capital C?" Monroe said, an obvious "Duh!" expression on his face. Nick just stared at him, furrowing his brow. "How can you not know what I'm talking about?! It's kind of a hands on thing to happen. They had to be up close and personal to do it! Lots of physical contact, up to and including licking and biting."

"Uuh... What?" Nick asked, hoping Monroe was mistaken. "Monroe, I haven't been with anyone like that since before Juliette left."

"Uh, then how the hell did it happen? I doubt anyone could have snuck up on you or something," Monroe said. "I mean, even if that happened, you would still know what I'm talking about!"

Rosalee came out of the kitchen, smiling. "Hey, Nick!" she said, as she went to hug him. She stopped short with her arms raised, then hastily covered her nose with her hands. "Wow! That is potent!" she said, letting out a cough.

Nick sighed. "Again! I don't know what you're talking about! I haven't been claimed by someone or whatever!"

"Yes, you have!" Rosalee said, finally taking her hands away from her face. "How can you not know?" She turned to Monroe. "How can he not know?"

"Um, I'm not sure," Monroe told her, then stared at Nick and asked slowly, "Nick, were you... unconscious or incapacitated or something? Some time in the last week? Is there something that might have allowed someone to get close enough to bite you without your knowledge?"

"Bite me?" Nick shook his head, then looked to the side, his brow furrowed in thought. "I got drunk the other night."

"Like, passed out drunk?" Monroe asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"Mostly, yeah. What do you mean, bite?"

"Who were you with?" Rosalee asked, seeming slightly worried.

"Just Hank and Wu and the Captain, we went to a bar. The Captain took me home," Nick said. "Well, no, he took me to his... place... uh."

Monroe got closer to Nick and took a deep whiff of Nick's scent. He coughed. "Yeah," he coughed again, rubbing at his nose. "Yeah, that's Zauberbiest I'm smelling. Slight hint of Royal and very expensive cologne. Definitely Captain Renard." He grabbed Nick's shoulder and turned him around, then pulled down the back of his shirt collar to reveal the back of his neck and shoulder. "Oop! Bite mark!"

"WHAT?!" Nick asked, slapping his hand to his neck and feeling it. There he felt the tell tale raised skin of a scar, from a bite that had obviously broken the skin. "But, I would've noticed a bite mark like that! It would have hurt, wouldn't it?"

"Not necessarily," Rosalee said. "Anspruch marks are licked to make them heal over and scar right away. There's an enzyme in certain Wesens' saliva that speeds up the healing of superficial wounds, specifically for this reason," she explained, turning and pulling down the back of her shirt to reveal her own mark, that must have been made while woged; the perfect oval of a human mouth but with canines that were a bit too long. Monroe blushed and reached to pull her shirt back up. Rosalee chuckled at the bright red of Monroe's cheeks.

"Okay," Nick said slowly. "Anspruch, Claiming pheromones, bite mark, claiming me as their mate. What does that all mean, exactly?" Nick asked, then hastily added, "Please, please, don't tell me it means what I think it means!"

"It means that your Captain marked you as his mate, putting his scent on you to ward off any sexual advances from any other Wesen, and unfortunately, from any other normal humans as well," Rosalee explained. Nick groaned in dismay. "The Anspruch pheromones sort of cover up your own pheromones, the ones that are essentially responsible for attracting others to you. So, since humans give off and recognize pheromones as well, even if they don't realize it, they will smell him instead of you and find you unattractive. And Wesen can smell his pheromones on you from a mile way." She frowned. "So, he did this to you without asking you first? "

Nick nodded, his mouth hanging open. "Yeah," he said.

"I didn't even know you two were in that kind of relationship," Monroe mused, putting his hands in his pockets.

"We aren't," Nick growled, his hands curling into fist. Then, he turned around and opened the door. "Excuse me, I'll have to take a rain check on that lunch. I have to go... castrate a Zauberbiest." He closed the door behind himself, slamming it a bit harder than he meant to.

Monroe and Rosalee looked at each other. "Uh oh," Monroe said.

* * *

Nick walked into the precinct with a purpose, barely looking at any thing or any one else. He had one aim: rip Renard's testicles off.

"Hey, Nick! Thought you had the day off?" Hank called from his desk.

"I do!" Nick replied, not even glancing at his partner. "But I have a bone to pick with the Captain." And he stormed into the Captain's office.

Captain Sean Renard looked up as soon as his door opened, wondering who would have the nerve to come in without knocking. "Nick," he acknowledged, signing the document in front of him and setting it aside.

Nick slammed the door behind him and stood in front of Renard's desk, crossed his arms and glared down at him. "You Claimed me?"

The corner of Renard's mouth turned up a little. "Took you long enough to notice."

"I didn't notice," Nick admitted. "Monroe and Rosalee did before I could get within ten feet of them!" Renard smirked. "Please, tell me you can undo it!"

"No," Renard said, standing up. "The mark you're stuck with forever, though it will fade a little over time." He started closing the shades on all the windows in his office. "The pheromones will wear off in a few days." He flicked the lock on the door and turned to Nick. "However, I have no intention of letting either the mark or the pheromones fade."

"Why?" Nick growled.

"Do I really need to explain it to you?" Renard asked, coming to stand in front of the Grimm.

Nick nodded. "Yeah, you need to explain why you did this. Why you think it's okay for you to Claim me as your mate, when we aren't even in that kind of relationship to begin with. Not to mention doing it without asking me first, or even considering what I wanted." Nick stared at Renard for a moment before lowering his voice to a low rumble. "You never do anything without a motive, so what do you get out of tying me to you like this?"

"Aside from having you tied to me at all, as something more than a Captain and his subordinate?" Renard asked in return. "There are many reasons. I will admit that some of them are political. Having a Grimm at my side gives me great advantages over my rivals and enemies. Any Royal having a Grimm on their side will give them a greater standing than even the traditional Royal families; like my father for example. Other reasons for Claiming you are completely selfish on my part. But the only reason you need to concern yourself with, is the fact that I am attracted to you and, now that you're single, I actually have a chance to make it happen without having to do something... drastic."

"Something drastic?" Nick asked. "Claiming me without my permission isn't drastic? And what would you have done if Juliette hadn't left? You would have... what? Had her killed?"

The Captain shrugged. "I won't deny it could have been an option, though only as a last resort."

Nick shook his head with his jaw slacked, not knowing what to say to that. All he really wanted to do in response was hit Renard in the face, but he couldn't do that in the middle of the precinct. He was sorely tempted to do it anyway, though!

"You are unbelievable, you know that!" Nick hissed.

All Captain Renard did was smile. "You've said that to me before. You say I'm unbelievable, yet I'm always telling you the truth when you call me that."

"Now's really not the time to be a smart ass," Nick snapped at him. Renard smiled wider and took a couple steps closer to Nick, who in turn backed away. "What are you doing?" Nick asked, glancing at the locked door.

"Just reaffirming what's mine," Renard answered, as he pushed Nick roughly up against the wall and crushed their lips together.

Nick pushed against the Captain with his hands, but he and the Captain were matched for strength, so it had little effect. Pinned up against the wall as he was, Nick couldn't get enough leverage to push the Captain away, especially once his wrists were snatched and pinned by the Captain's large hands. Nick's next instinct was to bite, so he sunk his teeth into Renard's lip. Renard moaned softly, then woged into his Zauberbiest form and kissed Nick more forcefully, biting into Nick's lip and making the Grimm whimper in startled pain. Sean Renard silently thanked his promiscuous parents for his half-breed status that saved his powers from the effects of a Grimm's blood.

Nick didn't know or understand what had just happened, and he wouldn't know until later. By trading blood, they had just initiated the process of bonding. The process would only be completed once the two of them consummated the bond, and the bonding process would make them both crave the touch of the other until it was completed.

Taking Nick for his own was now Sean Renard's top priority, but bedding the Grimm of Portland would prove much more of a challenge for the Royal Zauberbiest than simply Claiming him had been.

Renard growled and broke the kiss, then flipped Nick around, pressing him face first against the wall. With one hand he yanked the collar of the Grimm's shirt down and the other went around to cover his mouth, just as he sunk his sharper than normal teeth into the bite mark on Nick's shoulder. Nick yelled against Renard's hand, the sound coming out more like a muffled moan, instead of the shout of pain it was meant to be.

With the Captain pressed up against his back, Nick could feel the taller man's stiffening member poking into him. 'That's it!,' Nick thought to himself. His patience snapped and he smashed his elbow backwards into the Captain's ribs. Renard's teeth were ripped from Nick's flesh, as he stumbled backward with a grunt of pain. The wound on Nick's shoulder bled copiously, since it was torn deeper than Renard had intended and hadn't been licked. Nick spun around and punched the man square in the jaw and knocked him onto his ass, then stormed out of the room. Thankfully, his shirt was black, so no one saw the blood stain that was spreading down his shoulder and back.

Captain Sean Renard stood up, smirking and rubbing his jaw, while licking the remnants of Nick's blood from his lips. "Oh, my dear, oblivious baby Grimm," he muttered to himself, as he sat down behind his desk once again.

**TBC**


	2. Chapter 2

**Sorry for the long paragraphs. I tried to cut them down and split them up, but they still ended up really long.**

* * *

**Chapter 2**

Nick went home after that. He walked into his house - the same one he'd shared with Juliette - and slammed the door behind him as hard as he could, causing the window in the top of the door to crack. He ignored it and went upstairs to the master bathroom. He stripped his shirt off and turned to get a look at the bite mark in the mirror. It was wide and deep and still bleeding. Just looking at it made Nick furious.

He growled to himself and put a towel over the wound to staunch the bleeding. He held it there for a couple minutes, fuming as he remembered what happened in the Captain's office and what was said. He shook his head, tossed the bloody towel on the floor and stripped the rest of his clothes off, noticing that the blood had seeped down into the fabric of his jeans as well and made a mental note to check the driver seat in his car for blood later.

He decided to take a shower and wash the stink of Sean Renard off of him. He was pretty sure it wouldn't work and it would probably make his wound bleed again, but he was still going to try. He even grabbed a pumice stone and used it to 'exfoliate', though it was more like scraping the entire top layer of his skin off.

Once he was finished, his skin was red and he was still fuming and spoiling for a fight. He put a gauze bandage over the bite mark and got dressed, grabbed his keys, and left for the trailer.

Hopefully, his ancestors will have something to say about Claiming or Anspruch marks and pheromones. He'd never really done any major research into Royals either, so he thought it was about time to do that as well, all things considered. He stopped at a little Japanese restaurant and grabbed some take-out on his way by, then headed straight for the storage yard. He sent a text to Monroe to tell him where he was and asked him if he had time to come by and help or offer advice. Monroe quickly sent a message back saying that he would be there soon with Rosalee, after they stopped at the spice shop to grab a couple books that Rosalee had about the subject.

For a good fifteen minutes after he'd gotten to the trailer, Nick sat in silence at the small desk and used that time to eat his teriyaki chicken and draw a few sketches of Wesen to help himself calm down a little more. He pulled his own personal Grimm journal out of the pile and made another entry about a Wesen he saw at the Japanese restaurant.

Ever since he found out what he was and what he was seeing, Nick made a point of drawing and describing every single Wesen he encountered in his own journal. He would write the person's name, if he knew it, and their breed and then he would draw a perfect likeness of both their human face and then their woged face from memory and then filled in the rest of the space on the page with his story of how he saw or met that Wesen and how he felt about the way that Wesen was living their life, or at least of what he'd seen of their life.

Most of his entries had good things to say about the ones he'd seen or encountered, especially the ones he hadn't met while on the job. He'd made several entries about Monroe, Rosalee, Bud and even the Captain, since he spent the most time with them. And, though they may not be Wesen, Nick had even made entries about Juliette, Hank, and Wu, and also his own mother, Kelly, and Aunt Marie.

He brought his pen up to start a new entry about Renard, but his hand shook as it hovered over the page as his fury rose again. He was too angry to draw or write about that bastard right now, so he dropped his pen and closed his journal, just as Monroe and Rosalee knocked and came inside the trailer.

"What happened?" Monroe asked right away, as he sat down on the small bed. In answer, Nick took his shirt off and carefully peeled the bandage off of his shoulder. Monroe came over to get a better look at the gaping, jagged, semi-oval shaped wound in his friend's shoulder. "Jesus! What did he do? Maul you!?"

"No, I don't think he meant to make it so deep," Nick said, honestly. "But I wasn't exactly happy about being strong-armed into renewing the mark. So, I hit him and left before he even had the chance to lick it." Nick sighed and added, "Or before I had the chance to do more than just punch him in the face."

Rosalee fished a small jar out of her purse. "I had a feeling something like this might have happened." She went over to Nick and applied a little bit of the cloudy viscous contents of the jar to Nick's wound. "This is a special healing ointment, it'll work in a similar fashion to how the licking would have. It's not as quick or thorough as licking, but it'll scab it over at least and reduce the pain."

The ointment made the wound tingle and the throbbing sting started to abate. "Thank you," Nick said, sighing in relief.

Rosalee smiled and wiped her hands off on a handkerchief, then plopped the jar back into her purse. "So, you want to know about the Binden Process?" she asked.

"Binden Process?" Nick asked.

"The Anspruch marks and pheromones are only the first step in the Binden or Bonding Process," Monroe said.

Nick stared at them slack-jawed. "Bonding process?! He wants to bond with me?" Monroe and Rosalee nodded. "Define bonding?" he asked, in hopes that it would be something other than what he thought it was.

"Bonding as in binding, uniting, tying, unifying... marrying," Monroe said tentatively.

"He wants to marry me?!" Nick shrieked in a higher voice than he even thought was possible for him to do. Monroe cringed at the volume.

"That would be the only explanation," Rosalee said, shrugging her shoulders. "That is the only reason a Wesen would do this process. He wouldn't have made this decision lightly, because once it's been initiated there is almost no way of going back."

Nick sighed and put his face in his hands. Did he trip and fall down a rabbit hole? "You said almost no way. So, is there a way to stop it?" he asked.

Rosalee chewed on her lip a moment. "There is, but it depends on what stage you're at in the Binden Process. What all has the Captain done, that you know of?"

Nick took a deep breath and thought about it. "Just the pheromones and the biting that I know of. He kissed me... and there was obvious evidence that he wanted to do more poking into my back when he bit me."

"So, he's obviously had your blood, but have you tasted his?" Monroe asked.

Nick stopped and blinked. "Why?" he asked apprehensively.

Monroe and Rosalee gave each other a despairing glace. "If you've traded blood, then you've already gone past the point of no return," Rosalee informed. "At this point, the bond has been started and it'll act like it has a mind of its own, driving the two of you together until it's completed. You can try to fight it, if you want, but I've never heard of anyone successfully backing out after blood sharing."

Nick gave a deep suffering sigh and slouched to put his head on the desk, drawing his arms up to wrap around his head, like he was trying to hide from the world.

"What if I just avoided him?" Nick asked, his voice muffled under his arms.

"What do you mean?" Monroe asked. "You can't exactly avoid him, man. He's your boss."

Nick sat up and looked at his friends. "Well, what if he wasn't my boss anymore? I could transfer to another precinct or something. Would I be able to avoid this if I stayed away from him?"

"You can try," Rosalee said. "But don't any transfers or resignations have to go through your captain to be accepted? I don't see him approving something like that."

"Usually, it would have to go through him," Nick said, nodding. "But if I take it to the Police Chief and tell him that I'm having a dispute with the Captain and that it's affecting our work, he would be the one to handle it."

"You sure you want to just quit your job?" Monroe asked. "Or even transfer to another precinct. You'd have to leave Portland. Isn't that a little extreme for fighting a battle that you'll probably end up losing anyway?" Nick sighed again and put his face back on the desk with a dull thunk. "Not to mention the fact that Renard isn't going to just let you leave, man. He seems like the type that would just lock you up and throw away the key, just to keep you from leaving."

Nick sat up again. "Well, I'm not going to give him a choice, or make it easy for him," he said decisively. "This is my life, I don't need him fucking with it any more than he already has!"

Monroe held his hands up in surrender. "Fine, fine. It's your choice. So, what are you going to do?"

Nick took a deep breath. "I'm going to go find an apartment out of town, then hand my request for transfer to Renard. If he denies it, I'll go to the Police Chief and hand in my badge."

"What if the Police Chief denies it?" Rosalee asked. Nick looked at her with confusion. "Nick, Renard is a Royal and a Zauberbiest. He's a master at politics and manipulating people and he has the money to do it. I wouldn't be surprised if the Police Chief and even the Commissioner and the Mayor were in his back pockets. He probably has influence over anyone with any shred of power or importance. Especially importance to you. Nick, he tried to buy Monroe's and my loyalty as soon as he was sure we knew who he was." Nick stared at them, dumbfounded. Rosalee smiled mischievous. "Don't worry, he didn't succeed."

"He was kinda pissed when I told him to go away. Though, I didn't say it in so many words," Monroe said, shrugging.

Nick snorted and sighed again. "Well, then I'll throw my badge and gun on Renard's desk and just leave."

"What would you do for a living then?" Monroe asked.

Nick shrugged. "I don't know, I don't really have any other skill sets." Nick sighed and shook his head. "I'll figure something out, if it comes to that. I'll give it a week, hand in my transfer request and see what happens."

"Okay, man," Monroe said, shrugging.

Rosalee nodded. "Well, if you need anything, call us. In the meantime, I'm going to do some research and see if there's a way to reverse or nullify a bond. But you should do some thinking too, Nick." She put her hand on his uninjured shoulder to make him look at her. When he did, she smiled sadly at him. "You need to think about if being bonded to Captain Renard is such a terrible thing." When Nick opened his mouth to argue, she cut him off. "I know he did it behind your back and without your permission, but the point is, he would not have done it lightly. There's every likelihood that he did it this way because he thought there wasn't any other way of winning your affections. He is a man, Nick, and you've only ever been known to go for women. If he didn't do this, you probably wouldn't have even given him a chance."

"I just don't understand what he hopes to accomplish with this," Nick told her, looking a little helpless. "Wanting to bond with me because he's attracted to me is one thing - and he did admit to being attracted to me - but he said that having a Grimm with him would also give him more power and standing over his enemies. He pretty much told me right to my face, that he would have killed Juliette to get her out of the way, if she and I hadn't broken up." Monroe's eyes widened and flashed red; he liked Juliette, and would have torn Renard apart if he'd done something like that. "Why, so he can build his own kingdom? And then what? What's he going to do with it?"

"I don't know," Rosalee confessed. "But, if he plans on making a different kind of Wesen government, having someone like Renard as a leader would be the lesser evil, compared to the Royal families. Especially after seeing all the lives they almost destroyed as collateral damage from that last stunt to try and capture you. But whatever he's doing, if he wants to overthrow his family or something like that, he plans on taking you with him."

Nick furrowed his brow in slight apprehension. He wasn't sure he liked the sound of that.

"I don't know what his end game is, Nick," Rosalee continued. "But it involves you and he's probably going to hold onto you with everything he has." Rosalee sighed and chewed on her lip. "My point is, I'm just not sure fighting this Binden Process with the Captain is such a good idea for you, him, or anyone else that would be affected by the outcome. And, considering this is you and the Prince of Portland we're talking about, anyone else would be the entire Wesen community of the State of Oregon." Nick sighed heavily and put his face in his hands.

"And, you know, Nick," Monroe started. "I'm not one for politics, you know I'm not one for politics. Politics generally just make my head hurt."

Nick chuckled lightly, nodding his agreement to that sentiment.

"But with the way things are now," Monroe said. "Every Wesen in Portland and even the whole Northwestern portion of the United States, and Renard's family back in Austria and the other Royal Families, even the guys from the Dragon's Tongue over in Japan, know that you and Renard work together to protect and take care of Portland and the rest of Oregon. And everyone knows that you're butting heads with the Renard family." Monroe paused.

"They think of the two of you as one unstoppable unit," the Blutbad continued. "If you just up and disappear, that's likely to turn a few unsavory heads in the Captain's direction. All the vultures and the bottom feeders are going to move in and try to take over. People are going to go after Renard's head, and even more are going to hunt you down and try to take yours. Renard's family is going to jump at the chance to put him in his place and put you in yours - or at least what they think is your place. You two split up, in the end Renard is going to get killed and you will either be killed as well or forced to comply with whatever they want you to do. I'd personally rather see you and Renard bonded than to see both of you dead."

"So, what? I'm just supposed to let the Captain decide what to do with my life?" Nick asked, now looking stricken. He hadn't thought about the possible repercussions of quitting his job. He honestly hadn't thought further than he just wanted to get away from Renard. He didn't think about what other lives would be changed by it.

"No, we're not saying that," Monroe hurried to reassure him. "I totally disagree with what Renard has done to you. Hell, I'd love to rip his throat for doing this to you. But I think you should think this through a little more before you jump off the deep end. You're not just Detective Nick Burkhardt; cop by day, Grimm by night. You're a pillar of the Wesen community. More than that, you're the frickin' load bearing wall now, man. Remove you from the picture and the whole construct caves in on itself, and people know that. A lot of people have come to rely on you just being there to protect them, something they didn't have before. The Wesen community of Portland was a pretty leaky boat, before you came along and plugged up all the holes."

"The point is, Nick," Rosalee continued. "You've helped a lot of people, you've saved even more, you've scared all the bad guys off..."

"Well, most of them," Monroe cut in.

"And more good Wesen have moved into Oregon just to be near someone who is willing to protect them," Rosalee continued, sending a small glare at Monroe. "You've changed the way most Wesen look at Grimms. Instead of a nightmare, you've turned into a guiding light. No one has seen a Grimm that was willing to do all that in centuries."

"And Renard, who was raised and taught the history of the Royals and the Grimms," Monroe picked up. "Has seen the possibility of fixing what's been broken all these years."

Nick stared at Monroe, suddenly feeling like the weight of the world was on his shoulders. And in hindsight, it probably was. He was a different kind of Grimm, and his effort to just be himself and do his job, had turned more heads and changed more lives than he ever thought possible. It was never his intention to be more than just Detective Nick Burkhardt, but now that he was more than that, apparently there was no going back.

Monroe stared at Nick for a moment, thinking things over in his head. "Remember, you told us your mom said that the Grimms used to work for the Royals. Well, when you told us that, Rosalee and I were intrigued and we wanted to find out what the hell happened. So, we've talked to some people, pulled some strings and called in some favors and done our own research. Turns out, the Grimms used to be the arbitrators, the police of the Wesen world, if you will." Monroe shifted in his seat.

"Royals were the rulers, they made the decisions for what was best for the community," Monroe explained. "And they counted on the Grimms to keep the trouble makers in line and protect those that needed protecting. That way of thinking went out the window about eight hundred years ago during the Fourth Crusade, and since then, things have just gone down hill and gotten completely out of hand."

"Instead of protecting Wesen, Grimms started killing Wesen," Rosalee cut in. Both of them seemed eager to finally get all of this out and to take the opportunity to tell Nick everything they'd found and what they'd figured out on their own . "Without the Grimms, instead of protecting their kingdoms and ruling with fairness and mercy, Royals turned into power hungry tyrants and it's been that way ever since."

"Now, fastforward to the present era," Monroe started. "People have forgotten what it used to be like, Wesen are scared, Grimms are feared, Royals are desperate and bloodthirsty. Then suddenly, there's a half-Royal who wants to be more than a bastard son of the King of Austria and to be a better ruler than his father or fore-fathers ever were. Then, there's also a Grimm who wants to be the good guy, who is making friends with almost every Wesen he meets and all he wants to do is help Wesen and humans alike and as fairly as possible."

"By some miracle, you're both in the same city and you know each other and you both want the same thing. But that's all it takes," Rosalee continued, smiling. "It completely blows my mind to say this, but this is where a new world order would start, Nick. A new order that the Wesen world badly needs. Renard has seen that possibility, everyone has seen that possibility. That's why Renard's family is so desperate to get you and your key away from him. He gains too much power by having you around, and his family doesn't like that. And he wants to make sure that you can't be taken away from him. With the two of you bonded, most Wesen would see it as some kind of sacrilege to separate you two. Which means, more people would fight to keep you together. He's trying to protect you both by doing this." Rosalee paused. "He's going about it all wrong, but his intentions are logical and mostly pure. Quite frankly, I still want to whollop him with my tea kettle for forcing this on you, but this could still be a good thing."

Rosalee watched Nick for a moment, hesitating before she added the last piece of information that Nick needed to know. "Nick, remember Ian? Ian Harmon, the leader of the Resistance that you helped a couple years ago?" Nick nodded, struck speechless by everything that was being laid on him. "I've been in contact with him. Do you know that even the Laufer have people in Portland? They moved them in a few months ago, and they're here to protect you. Just to protect _you_! I'm sure they're here to keep an eye on Renard as well, but they are mostly here to keep you safe from any assassins that the Royals might send after you. They know that you and Renard are the key to getting what they and most other Wesen have always wanted. Freedom from the Royal Families."

Nick once again had his head buried in his arms over the desk. "This is too much," he whispered.

"It's still up to you," Rosalee said, wrapping Nick in her arms from behind as best she could. "It's still your life. We will support you in any decision you make. We just wanted to be sure you thought about everything beforehand. I know it's alot and it's a big decision and really I don't envy you, but you needed to know all the angles involved."

"Like you said before, give it a week, hand in your transfer and see what happens," Monroe put in. "You and Renard don't have to be together to continue to protect the Wesen community. Honestly, I can see why he did this, but I think he jumped at the chance way too fast. And, hey, maybe Rosalee and I can find something that will either stop the bond or at least delay it until you're ready for it."

Nick looked up at Monroe, glancing around at Rosalee who was still holding him. He nodded his head. "It would be great, if you guys could find something to help out. I'll... think about everything and make a decision. Maybe I'll just see how things go at work for the next few days."

TBC


End file.
